"It was all there in the job title," Cass breathed, anger flooding her, causing the vortex to slowly rise through her veins, tinting them a slight gold, "the Head of Human Resources."
Behind her, she could feel the Doctor grab her, trying to spread come calmness through her, trying to temper a power he'd always believed to be destructive and deadly from rising in her.
But she knew better, after all...it had always been a part of her.
"But..." Donna murmured quietly, "we were getting married."
At the sound of her voice, the pure sadness and heartbreak ringing through it, Cass turned to her, feeling the pulse of anger calm down, as she gently reached down and grabbed her hand, trying to lend her courage and strength as Lance sneered, "Well, I couldn't risk you running off. I had to say yes. And then I was stuck with a woman who thinks the height of excitement is a new flavour Pringle. Oh, I had to sit there and listen to all that yap yap yap...'oh, Brad and Angelina... is Posh pregnant?' X Factor, Atkins Diet, Feng Shui, split ends, text me, text me, text me, dear God, the never ending fountain of fat, stupid trivia." Snorting, he shook his head, "I deserve a medal."
"Is that what she offered you?" Cass turned to him, her voice low, icy enough to chill him from the inside out. Tilting her head, she gave him a small, frightening smile, "The Empress of the Racnoss? What are you? Her consort?"
He swallowed, very obviously growing more and more scared of her stillness, of the impossible way her veins and eyes seemed to glow, of the small, frigidly menacing smile she was shooting him. But he shook his head, swallowing harshly as he mustered as much fake bravado as he could, "It's better than a night with her."
Donna whimpered, "But...I love you."
Lance ignored her, turning to look at the Doctor, knowing that if he continued looking at the redhead he would lose his courage, "That's what made it easy. It's like you said, Doctor, the big picture, what's the point of it all if the Human Race is nothing? That's what the Empress can give me. The chance to... go out there. To see it. The size of it all. I think you understand that, don't you, Doctor?"
The Empress turned to face the Time Lords, asking, "Who is this little physician? And his glowing companion?"
"What she said," Lance replied, tilting his head towards the heartbroken Donna, "Martians."
Cass chuckled lowly, the sound far more frightening than it should have been, and the Doctor grew still, muscles growing tense under the mounting fury he felt as he looked at the Empress head on, "Oh, we're sort of... homeless. But the point is, what's down here? The Racnoss are extinct. What's gonna help you four thousand miles down? That's just the molten core of the Earth, isn't it?"
Lance turned to the Empress, commenting in a casual, conversational tone, "I think he wants us to talk."
"I think so too."
"Well, tough! All we need is Donna!"
"kill this chattering little doctor-man and his glowing girl!"
Immediately, Donna jumped right in front of them, arms spread wide, as though to protect them, "Don't you hurt them!"
Cass put a hand on her shoulder, murmuring, "Donna, it's okay.."
"NO!" She cut her off, "I won't let them!"
The Time Lady turned to her tether with raised brows, a small smile on her face at the gesture, and he shrugged, tugging her closer to him, as though they didn't have a care in the world.
Above them, the Empress yelled, "At arms!" And they could hear the sounds of guns cocking, as the robots lining the walls prepared to shoot.
"Ah, now. Except..." The Doctor began.
"Take aim!" The Empress yelled, cutting him off.
He tried again, shaking his head when he heard his tether's chuckles, "Well, I just want to point out the obvious..."
"They won't hit the bride. They're such very good shots." The spider interrupted him again.
"Just... just... just... hold on, just a tick, just a tiny... just a little... tick. If you think about it, the particles activated in Donna and drew her inside my spaceship. So, reverse it..." he trailed off, and Cass stepped up beside him, holding up the tube of Huon particles, and twisting the knob on top of it, smirking as both it and Donna began glowing, "the spaceship comes to her."
"Fire!" The Empress yelled, but it was too late, as the TARDIS had already materialised around them, both Time Lords jumping to the console and piloting them out.
"Off we go!" The Doc grinned, not looking at the bride, eyes too focused on the console, "Oh, you know what I said before about time machines? Well, I lied. And now we're gonna use it. We need to find out what the Empress of the Racnoss is digging up. If something's buried at the planet core, it must've been there since the beginning. That's just brilliant. Molto bene! I've always wanted to see this. Cassie, Donna, we're going further back than I've ever been before."
But Cass could see her.
She noticed the way Donna was huddling in on herself, the way she seemed to be biting into her lip to hold back her tears, and she knew, she just knew...her tether's enthusiasm wasn't what she needed.
So slowly, she headed her way, wrapping a strong arm around her shoulder, before whispering reassuringly, "I know it's hard to believe, that it feels like this is going to be everlasting, eternal hell..but it does get better. Heartbreak and pain...they fade eventually, and one day, Donna, you're not even gonna remember what Lance was like."
"Yeah?"
The word was filled with so much hope, with so much pain, the Time Lady tightened her hold around the woman, before nodding slowly, "Yeah, I promise. Time...time is the greatest of healers."
The Doctor walked slowly to them, peering down at the heartbroken woman gently, before nodding towards the door, "We've arrived... want to see?"
"I s'pose," she shrugged softly, rising along with Cass, who still had her arm around her shoulders, and following her to the door, smiling lightly when the redhead teased her man with a smirk, "We'll just open the doors, Time Lord. The scanner's way to small for three heads, barely fits your own as is."
He chuckled, nodding his head with a small smile, coming to stand next to her, his hand on the small of her back as they pushed the doors open together, Cass breathing, "Donna Noble, welcome to the creation of the Earth."
The bride's mouth dropped open, the sun was shinning through beautiful coloured dust and gas clouds, enormous rocks floating around.
"We've gone back 4.6 billion years. There's no solar system, not yet. Only dust and rocks and gas." The Doc began.
Cass pointed, continuing, "That's the Sun over there, brand new. Just beginning to burn."
"Where's the Earth?" Donna breathed softly.
"All around us, in the dust." he replied, eyes not on the beautiful, astounding view outside, but his tether's star-filled eyes.
"Puts the wedding in perspective. Lance was right. We're just... tiny."
Cass shook her head, smiling lightly at the woman, "No, Donna. That's the point, that's what you do. The human race. Making sense out of chaos. Marking it out with weddings and Christmas and calendars. This whole process is beautiful, but only if it's being observed."
"So, I came out of all this?"
"Yeah, kinda cool, right?" She nudged her softly, smile growing when the ginger woman shot her a tiny one back, before pointing to a large rock floating lazily past them and joking, "I think that's the Isle of Wight."
All three of them laughed, taking a minute to simply appreciate the humour in the words, to appreciate the moment they were in and exactly what it was they were witnessing.
He found that his eyes landed almost unconsciously to his Luna, as though he couldn't really bear to look away from her for longer than a second at a time. And it wasn't just the tether either, they'd been together long enough for the bond to have settled now.
It was just him. He loved her, adored her really, and because of that, because she was everything good and great and wonderful in his life, he sometimes found himself unable to look away, fearful that the second he did, she would just vanish from his life forever.
And in moments like these, when he got to show her something she'd never seen before, when he watched her eyes reflect the shine of the stars, and grow wide with wonder and amazement, he found that he fell for her even more. Because she gave him this gift, allowed him to experience the universe through the eyes of someone who'd never seen it, to feel all the amazement and wonder he once did, and remember exactly why he'd begun travelling in the first place.
"Eventually," Cass' voice drew his attention, as it always did, and he found her still staring outside, explaining to the human slowly, "gravity takes hold. Say, one big rock, heavier than the others, starts to pull other rocks towards it. All the dust and gas and elements get pulled in, everything, piling in until you get the..." she trailed off, looking at Donna happily as she finished, "Earth."
"But the question is... what was that first rock?" The Doc added, right as a large, star-shaped rock floated past them, Donna pointing to it, "Look!"
"The Racnoss," the redhead whispered softly, eyes narrowed in thought.
The Doctor, meanwhile, rushed back to the console and turned a wheel frantically, eyes wide in confusion as he asked, "Hold on, the Racnoss are hiding from the war! What's it doing?"
Both women kept their eyes outside, watching as rocks, particles of dust and gas, all zoomed towards the Racnoss as though drawn by a magnetic force.
"Exactly what you said." Donna said.
Cass shook her head, adding, "they didn't just bury something at the centre of the Earth... they became the centre of the Earth. The first rock."
He turned to look at her, eyes wide in surprise, before stumbling to the ground, as the TARDIS suddenly shuddered violently.
"What's that?" Donna asked.
The redhead pushed her inside, closing the doors to keep either of them from falling into the vacuum of space, as the Doctor muttered, "Trouble."
The shaking became worse, the clever machine shuddering and tipping violently, which wound up with Cass smacking her hip harshly against the console, as she'd been trying to make her way to the Doc.
Hissing in pain, she rubbed the tender area that she knew would be badly bruised, as Donna yelped, "What the hell's it doing??"
"Remember that little trick I pulled, particles pulling particles." Cass told her, "It works in reverse, they're pulling us back!" She headed to her tether, limping lightly at the pain in her hip, ignoring the concerned look he was shooting her as they desperately tried to pilot the TARDIS. But it was beyond their control as they whirled through the vortex.
"Well, can't you stop it? Hasn't it got a handbrake? Can't you reverse or warp or beam or something?" The bride yelled in growing panic.
"Backseat driver." The Doc muttered, before his brows rose in thought, "Oh! Wait a minute!"
Leaning under the console, he pulled out the extrapolator, showing it to his tether who groaned, "Donna, hang on tight!"
"The extrapolator!" He grinned manically, "Can't stop us, but it should give us a good bump!"
The redhead wrapped her arms around one of the coral beams when she noticed he'd pulled a mallet form somewhere, squeezing her eyes shut tightly in preparation for how rough of a flight it's going to be, as he yelled, "Now!"
His arms were suddenly around her, holding onto both her and the beam tightly as the TARDIS hurtled through the vortex at break-neck speeds.
The second they rematerialised, Cass pulled away from him, muttering, "I despise you," under her breath as they headed outside.
He threw her a small wink, "No, you don't," before grabbing her hand and tugging her closer, turning to Donna and explaining, "We're about 200 yards to the right. Come on!"
They ran down the corridor, until they had to stop, having come to the doorway that led up to the Thames Flood Barrier.
"But what do we do?" Donna asked, huffing out of breath.
Cass rolled her eyes, as the Doc, with a stethoscope in his ear, listening to the barrier, answered without looking back, "I don't know! I make it up as I go along! But trust me, I've got a history."
"And trust me, it's not all glittery and shiny," his tether joked, shooting Donna a conspiratorial wink when he exclaimed, "Oi! I'm not that bad!"
"But I still don't understand." Donna cut in, shaking her head softly, "I'm full of particles, but what for?"
"There's a Racnoss web at the centre of the Earth, but my people unravelled their power source." He began explaining softly, not looking back at them, "The Huon particles ceased to exist but the Racnoss are stuck."
Unbeknownst to him, two robots had snuck up behind the women, grabbing them, planting hands on their mouths to keep them from screaming for help as they dragged them away.
The Doc meanwhile, continued explaining obliviously, "They've just been in hibernation for billions of years. Frozen. Dead. Kaput! So you're the new key. Brand new particles, living particles! They need you to open it and you have never been so quiet." He turned around, only for his eyes to double in size when he noticed his tether's absence.
She wasn't scared or panicked, he could feel that much. Actually, she was rather annoyed.
But he was terrified, images of the last time she'd been away from him in a Torchwood building flooding his mind, as he yelled out to her, Luna?!
About time you noticed, Time Lord, she drawled back sarcastically.
You're okay? He asked, franticness bleeding into his inner voice, they didn't hurt you.
He could feel her trying to reassure him, could feel her sending floods of calmness and some amusement to him as she said, I'm perfectly alright, honey. Honestly, you gotta stop underestimating my ability to take care of myself. You're the reckless one in this relationship, I'm the one who thinks before she inevitably jumps to follow you.
He couldn't hold his chuckle back at her tone, annoyed and grumpy, and he just knew, she'd rolled her eyes at some point or another. Before he could ask for her location though, she allowed him to see her memory of being dragged away through her mind, giving him the directions needed to get to her.
I'm coming now, love. Try not to antagonise the Racnoss into killing you please. He promised.
But she's so annoying, Theta! His tether whined back jokingly, Honestly, you can't hold my own tongue against me...
Just...please, behave until I get there. I'm coming now.
A second of silence, and then she sighed, petulantly and humorously enough that he knew she was trying to reassure him, to make him laugh in order to force the tether into believing she was perfectly alright, fine, Time Lord. Just 'cause I love you.
I love you too, Luna. He whispered back, before turning around, sonic in hand, only to find an armed robot in front of him.
———————
Cass rolled her eyes for the umpteenth time since she and Donna had been captured by the Empress.
Honestly, she was starting to grow very annoyed and impatient with the dramatics, as well as the constant bickering of the couple beside her, since they had all been wrapped together, side-by-side in the giant net.
"I hate you." Donna hissed at Lance hatefully.
He rolled his eyes, "Yeah, I think we've gone a bit beyond that now, sweetheart."
"Lance, do you want me to karate chop your balls off, blend them up, and then force-feed them to you?" Cass drawled casually, looking for all the world as though she'd just described the weather, and not some horrific torture method, "because I will, if you don't stop talking."
He shook his head, staying quiet, and she grinned lightly, before rolling her yes once more as the Empress crowed, very dramatically, "My golden couple. Together at last, your awful wedded life. Tell me; do you want to be released?"
"Yes!" They both shouted at once.
"You're supposed to say 'I do'." The Racnoss smirked.
Lance scoffed, shaking his head, "Ha. No chance." Only to balk when the spider yelled, "Say it!"
He turned to Donna, "I do."
"I do." The ginger woman replied just as quickly, before turning to Cass, having heard her irritated sigh.
"She's about to say 'I don't'," the redhead muttered, nodding her head towards the spider, who indeed, did cackle, "I don't."
Cass looked at Donna, and quickly whispered, "Don't worry, you're gonna be fine." As the Empress added, "Activate the particles. Purge every last one!"
Suddenly, both Donna and Lance began glowing a vivid gold.
"And release!"
The particles extracted themselves from Donna and Lance, zooming down the hole in the ground, towards the centre of the earth.
"The secret heart unlocks. And they will waken from their sleep of Ages." The Racnoss announced.
Donna shook her head, "Who will? What's down there?"
"How thick..." Lance began, only to quiet down when he noticed the young redhead glaring at him, her eyes beginning to glow a furious gold.
"It's the Racnoss," she explained to Donna softly, "Her children."
"Yes.." The Empress hissed, "Now will be born to feast on flesh! The web-star shall come to me. My babies will be hungry. They need sustenance. Perish the web."
"Use her! Not me! Use her!" Lance yelled in fright.
The Racnoss hummed lightly, "Oh, my funny little Lance! But you are quite impolite to your lady-friend. The Empress does not approve."
The webbing around him loosened, and with a scream, Lance tumbled down into the hole.
"Laaaaaance!" Donna yelled in a panic, as Cass focused on the hole, noticing how the vortex had risen to the surface as soon as she'd called upon it, how now, it begged to be released.
But she knew, she felt it. Lance had to die. It was fixed.
And so she kept the power buried in her veins, itching to leave the surface even as the Empress shouted, "Harvest the humans! Reduce them to meat. My children are climbing towards me and none shall stop them!" She hissed, turning her head to face once robot in particular, who'd been climbing the stairs, "So you might as well unmask, my clever little doctor-man."
The Doc shrugged, taking both the robe and his mask off, face set in a jovial, causal expression, though nearly all of them could feel chills at his glare, the depths of his anger, the second his eyes landed on his tied up tether.
"Oh well. Nice try." He looked up at Cass who nodded eagerly, an excited grin growing on her face as she recalled what he'd do, and raised his sonic, untangling the webs from around her, allowing her swing in the air, until she reached him, and dropped herself into his arms happily.
Looking at Donna, he aimed the sonic her way, yelling, "I've got you, Donna!"
"I'm gonna fall!" She screeched as the webs loosened from around her.
Cass shook her head, yelling, "Donna, you're gonna swing! Like I did!"
Sure enough, she swung right over the hole on one of the stands of web and towards the tether couple, the Doc raising his arms towards her quickly, "I've got ya!"
Cass however, rolled her eyes fondly at him, calling up that buried power, and turning to look at Donna as she swung beneath them, slowly sending a flash of vortex her way, catching her before she hit the way, and gently lowering her to her feet.
She could feel the Doctor's worry at the display, but ignored it, knowing they really did have bigger fish to fry at the moment. And so, she shot Donna a small wink, before turning back around to face the Empress again, this time, with her tether by her side.
"The doctor-man amuses me." She cackled.
He shook his head, his anger flooding through Cass, the memory of her being hung up above the hole, of what could have happened if she'd fallen encapsulating his mind.
That, coupled with Rose's loss, and her transformation back into a Time Lady, and Cass knew he wouldn't be himself, not fully, at least.
"Empress of the Racnoss," he began warningly, "I give you one last chance. My tether and I can find you a planet. We can find you a place in the universe to coexist. Take that offer and end this now."
"These men are so funny."
Cass narrowed her eyes at her, head tilting lightly, fury mounting as she thought of the pain the Racnoss had caused the humans, "I'd consider it thoughtfully, were I you. Considering all you've done, the offer is far more than fair."
The Doctor nodded, adding, "What's your answer?"
"Oh, I'm afraid I have to decline." She laughed.
The Time Lord nodded, face setting in an unreadable expression, eyes shuttering behind walls, "What happens next is your own doing."
Beside him, Cass allowed the vortex to rise through her once more, knowing what her tether had planned.
But she refused to allow him to fall into his own darkness, much like she did hers.
He was better than her, so, so much better.
"I'll show you what happens next." The Empress hissed, "At arms!"
Around them, the robots raised their guns.
"Take aim!"
The guns clicked menacingly, swinging to land on them.
"And..."
"Relax," the Doctor stated, watching impassively as they deactivated, going completely limp.
From beneath them, Donna gated, "What did you do?"
"Know what I've got, Donna," He looked down at her, smirking, though his eyes still looked somewhat empty, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a large remote, "Pockets."
"How did that fit in there?"
Cass looked at her, smiling softly, motioning for the woman to remain quiet when she noticed her glowing eyes, as she replied, "They're bigger on the inside."
"Robo-forms are not necessary." The Racnoss cried, "My children may feast on Martian flesh."
"Except, we're not from Mars," Cassandra turned to her, chin raised defiantly.
"Then where?"
The Doctor stepped closer, "Our home planet is far away and long-since gone. But its name lives on. Gallifrey."
"They murdered the Racnoss!" She yelled, enraged.
He remained cold, simply saying, "I warned you. You did this."
Reaching into his pocket again, he produced a handful of baubles, the same ones used during Donna's reception, and the Empress gasped in fear, "No! No! Don't! No!"
But it didn't make a difference. He threw several handfuls of the baubles into the air. Some surrounded the Empress and some smashed into the walls of the corridor, destroying them and letting the water from the Thames rush though in torrents. Another bauble exploded, causing a fire at the Empress' feet. She wailed as water flooded into the chamber and down the hole.
"My children!"
Cass looked at her tether, noting how empty his eyes were, and shook her own, reaching down and threading their fingers together, her voice entering his mind at a much louder volume than before as she said, You come back to me right now, Theta. You come back to ME.
And just as he snapped out of his anger-induced hole, he realised that a golden wall kept the water from flooding more than it should. That it had stopped it right after the death of the Racnoss in the hole.
Turning his head, his hearts dropped at the sight of his Luna's glowing, golden eyes, as well as the light that seemed to protrude from her veins.
She was using the vortex, again. But she shouldn't...it would kill her!
He cupped her cheeks, slowly pulling her eyes to his own, whispering, in a language only they could understand, "Luna, let it go, love. It's okay, I'm here, with you. Just let it go, please!"
Much like he could never seem to refuse her anything, she couldn't refuse him either, as her eyes slowly returned to their normal green, the light diffusing from her veins, the golden wall disappearing, but not before gently guiding the water down, settling it calmly.
She blinked, before tugging him behind her and looking down at Donna, smirking, "Come on! Time we got you out!"
"Transport me!" The Empress cried, before teleporting away.
They grabbed the ginger woman the second they reached her, running back to the ladder and climbing it quickly, Donna huffing, "But what about the Empress?"
"She's used up all her Huon energy," The Doctor replied, "she's defenceless!"
When they reached the top, climbing out into the night, they all whooped in semi-glee, rejoicing that the Racnoss had been destroyed.
At least until Donna commented, "Just... there's one problem."
"What's that?" The Doc turned to her, before noticing his tether's laughter and tugging her into his chest, still feeling afraid of the vortex and the damage it may have caused her.
Cass looked up at him impishly, gesturing towards where the river once laid, "We may or may not have just...you know...drained the Thames."
He glanced over at the river, to notice that, sure enough, it was completely empty. Unable to help himself, he burst into laughter, both women joining him.
———————
The TARDIS materialised across the road from Donna's house, the three stepping outside.
"There we go." The man grinned, patting the time machine happily, "Told you she'd be all right. She can survive anything."
"More than I've done." Donna commented casually.
Cass whipped her sonic out, scanning the woman quickly, smiling as she read the results, "Nope! All the Huon particles have gone. No damage, you're just fine."
"Yeah, but apart from that... I missed my wedding, lost my job and became a widow on the same day. Sort of."
The redhead shook her head sadly, biting into her lip guiltily, "I'm sorry I couldn't save him."
Donna shrugged, saying coldly, "He deserved it."
Both Time Lords stared at her knowingly, and she sighed, shoulders dropping sadly, "No, he didn't." Looking at her house, she added, "I'd better get inside. They'll be worried."
"Best Christmas present you could ever give them, I think," Cass grinned, as the Doc wrapped his arm around her waist, tugging her to him, joking, "Oh, no, she forgot, you hate Christmas."
"Yes, I do." Donna smiled at them.
He raised his eyebrow, smirking, "Even if it snows?" Reaching around his tether, still keeping her in his grasp, he flipped a discreet switch on the side of the clever machine, causing a ball of light to shoot up in the air, snow slowly drifting downwards after.
Donna laughed in disbelief, as Cass looked at him fondly, the former gasping, "I can't believe you did that!"
"Oh, basic atmospheric excitation." He shrugged casually, the smile on his face gentling when he felt a caress of love from his tether, leaning down and pressing his lips to her head.
"Merry Christmas." The ginger woman whispered softly, the younger-looking redhead returning it, "And to you. So... what are you gonna do with yourself now, Donna Noble?"
"Not getting married for starters. And I'm not gonna temp anymore. I dunno... travel... see a bit more of planet Earth... walk in the dust. Just... go out there and do something."
The Doctor began, "Well, you could always..."
"What?"
"Come with us.." Cass finished, though she was looking at her knowingly, as though she already knew what her answer would be, and wasn't upset.
Donna shook her head softly, "No."
"Okay," the Doc immediately replied, shrugging casually.
"I can't..."
"No, it's fine."
"No, but really... everything we did today... do you two live your lives like that?"
Cass smiled gently, "Sometimes, but not always."
"I think you do. And I couldn't."
"But you've seen it out there," the Time Lord insisted, "It's beautiful."
"And it's terrible. That place was flooding and burning and they were dying and you were stood there like... I don't know... a stranger. And you," she turned to the redhead, "Your eyes were glowing and you made this golden light come from your fingers and...and then he made it snow. I mean, you two scare me to death!"
Cassandra nodded, understanding that the woman wasn't quite up to the adventures just yet...she would be, eventually, but it wouldn't be now.
Her tether, meanwhile, was staring at Donna with wide yes, not quite used to anyone but her addressing his temper with him, until he simply nodded, "Well then..."
"Tell you what I will do though," Donna added, smiling happily at them, "Christmas dinner. Oh, come on."
"We don't do that sort of thing." He immediately refused, but she insisted, "You did it last year, you said so. And you might as well because Mum always cooks enough for twenty."
Sensing his disbelief, and how much he just wanted to spend time with her, Cass interjected, grinning impishly, "Alright, alright, fine. We've just gotta park her," she pointed at the machine behind her, "Or rather, I've gotta park her, because the last time he did, she drifted into the 1800s!"
"Yeah," he nodded quickly, "Yeah, we'll see you in a minute."
They headed back into the clever machine, just beginning to dematerialise, but Donna called them back, voice loud, "Doctor! Cass!"
They popped their heads out of the door, the Doc muttering, "Blimey, you can shout," and Cass smiled at her, and she asked, almost desperate, "Am I ever gonna see you again?"
"Oh, yes." The redhead winked at her, grinning happily as she thought of the days to come.
"Just... promise me one thing," Donna continued, imploring, "find someone."
He shook his head, "I don't need anyone else, I have my tether."
"Yes, you do." She insisted, "Because sometimes, I think you both might need someone to stop you."
"Yeah," he breathed quietly, and beside him his tether smiled, "Thank you, Donna Noble. And just...be as magnificent and incredible as I know you can, okay?"
"I think I will, yeah." She nodded, watching as they headed back inside, but calling them right before the door closed, "Cass?"
The redhead popped her head out again, smiling gently, and Donna, knowing she would answer, finally asked again, "That friend of yours... what was her name?"
"Her name was Rose," the Time Lady whispered, before shooting Donna one final smile, and retreating back inside, the door finally closing, the Tardis shooting up into the night sky.
———————
He found her beneath the grating, tinkering with the TARDIS' systems.
Leaning against one of the coral beams, he couldn't help but smile gently at the sight; her with her sonic in hand, hair pulled up into a messy ponytail, as she soldered some wires into place, a smear of grease on her cheek.
She was beautiful, and lovely and brilliant and his.
Completely and utterly his.
"I can feel you staring, Theta," her amused voice rang out, and he grinned, walking to her, reaching down into the grating and pulling her up, laughing at her surprised squeal as he dropped her into his lap, straddling him completely, noses brushing against one another.
"I love you, Luna," he simply said, watching as her breath caught at the sound of her true name, as her cheeks flushed and her lips turned into a soft smile.
"I love you too," she breathed, before smirking knowingly, "And you can ask me, you know? Whatever questions have been eating at you all day, just ask Theta. I'll never lie to you."
He grinned at her words, adoring how well she knew him, "Why didn't you use your title? You told Donna to call you Cass."
She bit her lip, thinking her words through, "Our titles...we pick them as a promise. They're who we want to be, who we promise the universe to be, our mission...our souls, really. But..I never wanted to be The Oracle...it wasn't a name I chose. It was bestowed upon me by the High Council, because of my skills, because of what I could offer them. And...I guess, I don't feel like her anymore, you know? The Oracle...she was sad, and tired and cold and so fucking depressed its a wonder she made it through for as many centuries as she did. And I'm not, not here, not with you. And Cassandra...I chose that name, and it means the same thing in the end, except I actually like who I am, as Cass." Her hands moved to his cheeks, cupping them softly, "I'll always be The Oracle, the Visionary, the Reaper...and occasionally, I'll probably refer to myself as that too...but with you, in our clever machine, with those wonderful humans, I just want to be me, Cass, your Cassie, your Luna. Nothing more, nothing less."
His forehead came to rest on her own, hands moving to grasp her hips tightly, "Then that's who you'll be, always. My Cassie...My Luna. My beautiful, wondrous, impossible tether."
"What else? I know there's something else you wanted to ask," she breathed after a minute, looking at him meaningfully, knowing exactly what he wanted to ask about, but needing him to ask it, to voice the question.
"The vortex..." he began, "How? It wasn't meant to be wielded by anyone...that much power...it turned the Time Lords of the past into vengeful gods."
Luna bit her lip, a sad scoff leaving her as she remembered exactly why and how she could use the vortex, watching as his eyes narrowed in fury when the memory reached him, before answering, "The Council. My abilities...they're advanced. So highly inspired that I can virtually move through time like a mirror, choosing what to see. The Past, the present and the future. They theorised that with practice and maybe more exposure, I could grow to wield the vortex as a weapon, control it. And they knew a war was approaching, I'd warned them of it. So they took matters into their own hands, rising my exposure, slowly, bit by bit. Injecting me with waters form the Schism, until one day I was just...able to use it. Rassilon forced me to regenerate with it...like an overdose of sorts, and when I woke up, as The Reaper...I could use the vortex. Better than I can now."
When she felt the anger coursing through him, the pure rage, she shook her head, "Theta...I'm okay. I wouldn't change a single thing, not one line."
"How? They...tortured you, hurt you." He breathed, her memories finally registering in his mind, tears filling his eyes as he witnessed exactly what had been done to her, exactly how much they'd broken her to make themselves stronger.
She tenderly wiped the couple that fell, smiling happily, "Because it brought me you. If my reward for enduring all those years, all that pain is you, then I'd do it all over again in a heartbeat. Because you're worth it all."
He didn't say anything, but he didn't need to. She could feel his love for her coursing through her veins, lighting her up, filling her chest with warmth and adoration. She kept her eyes on him, smiling happily, until he brought her lips down to his own, kissing her hungrily, tongue moving over hers as he stood up, moving to their bedroom.
She was a full Time Lady now, he wouldn't have to hold anything back anymore.
